Manual

Everything SteamRoller adds to the Circuit Rhythm. All of the Rhythm's own functions work as described in Novation's user guide; this manual only covers what is new or different. To install, see Install.

Pads are counted left to right, top to bottom: pads 1–8 are the top row, 25–32 the bottom row.

The sound generator

In the Sample Rec view, pads of the third row control the generator. Each sound is synthesized on the Rhythm by one of two engines, so every press gives a new one.

Only one mode is on at a time. With neither on, the view behaves as stock: the two leftmost pads are then the Rhythm's own threshold-recording pads again.

Two engines

Turn generate or commit mode on, then press the leftmost pad for poundhard or the next one for BAYAREA. One engine is chosen at a time. The choice stays until you change it, and it also decides which engine makes the next kit page.

• poundhard: an FM drum voice (three operators, noise, filters, drive): kicks, snares, hats, claps, metal, noise and destroyed sounds.
• BAYAREA: a West Coast voice: a carrier morphing from sine to saw, frequency-modulated by two sines, a wavefolder, then a low-pass gate (a filter and an amplifier struck together) or, for swells and drones, a sustaining envelope over two filters; a saturating output and a bank of three resonators. Textures and strange noises first (scrapes, hiss, rumbles, whirs, chopped folds), with clunks and clangs; no kicks (poundhard's job), no pitch moves within a sound, and every sound with resonators of its own (or none). Ported from Tonitor's BAYAREA engine.

Generate mode

Press a track button for a new sound of that family from the chosen engine, played on that track's output. Press again for another. Shift + track button plays the current sound again, from the engine that made it. The track buttons don't leave the Sample Rec view while this mode is on.

Storing a sound

Turn commit mode on. A track button now plays that track's sound again. To store it, hold the track button and press a slot pad (rows 1–2, the page shown). The sound is written into that slot of the current pack, replacing what was there in every project that uses the pack, and plays once from the slot. Record does not need to be on.

Stored sounds last until they fade out (at most 2 seconds), are normalized to −1 dBFS, and are exactly what you auditioned. If the store can't start (no sound on that track, a store already running, or recording), the commit pad flashes orange and nothing is written.

Kits

Tap the kit pad to fill the page shown with 16 new sounds from the chosen engine, replacing that page's slots.

• In a pack with no generated sounds, the page is a balanced starter kit: kicks, snares, a clap, an impact, hats, a cymbal, metal, noise, a click and a destroyed sound, grouped by rows.
• To extend the kit, go to another page and tap again. The new page is planned from every generated sound already in the pack. Each page has its own focus: the three or four kinds of sound the pack has least of fill most of it and lead its first row, with a few others around them. Within each kind, the rarer characters come first. Over all eight pages the kit evens out, up to 128 sounds.
• Each page can come from either engine. Pages are planned against every generated sound in the pack, whichever engine made it. Each engine fills only the kinds of sound it plays: poundhard the snares, hats, claps, noise and the rest of its drums; BAYAREA clunks, clangs and chops, blips, and its textures: scrapes, rumbles, whirs and hiss (never kicks). So a BAYAREA page after a poundhard one goes where the kit is still thin, and the next poundhard page counts both.
• Each generated sample carries a small tag in its file, so this works across power-offs. Samples you recorded yourself are not counted.
• Hold the kit pad 1.5 s to clear the page shown (its 16 slots).

Parameter locks

A parameter lock stores a value on one step: the step plays with that value, the rest of the pattern with the track's own. There are two ways to set one, and both work the same way: Record on, then hold a step, and set the value with a knob or with the step sliders. Locks are sent a moment before their step and written straight to the sound chip, so they are in place when the sound starts. They save with the project.

With the knobs

Turn any of the eight knobs while holding the step: the sample controls, distortion and the filters. Turning a knob while nothing is held changes the track's own value, as stock. To remove a knob's locks, hold Clear and turn that knob: this clears its whole lane on the track.

With the step sliders

While you hold the step, the two bottom pad rows stop showing samples and become sliders for that step, two rows at a time. Still holding the step, the sample-page arrows scroll through them; when you let go, they go back to the top. A bright pad or bar is the step's lock, a dim one the track's own value. Press a pad to set the lock; press the pad that shows it again to remove it. (With Record off, holding a step and pressing a sample pad is the stock sample flip.)

Below these come the Grid FX rows.

Grid FX locks

Seven rows, one per Grid FX, in the colours of the Rhythm's own Grid FX view. Each row's eight pads are eight settings, more intense (or faster) to the right. Rates follow the project's tempo. A step can lock several effects at once.

Only the track that holds the lock is affected. While a locked hit plays, its track alone goes through the Grid FX and every other track bypasses them. When two tracks hold Grid FX locks at the same time, the newest lock takes over and the earlier track goes back to dry. With no Grid FX locks playing, every track goes through the Grid FX as usual, so the Grid FX view works on the whole mix as always.

How long a lock lasts

• A lock lasts for the whole sound of its step: the steps that trigger nothing keep it, so a kick panned right stays right for its whole tail. A Grid FX lock lasts the same way.
• The next hit without a lock returns the parameter to the track's own value (and switches the effect off).
• Locks belong to the step's content: deleting a step deletes its locks, and copying a step copies them.

Spice

Shift + a track button adds random locks to that track's current pattern. (In the Sample Rec view with generate mode on, Shift + track button replays a sound instead.)

Before adding anything, it reads the pattern: its length, which hits repeat in every bar (the backbone), which change (fills), accents and ghost notes, rolls, how much room each hit has, and what the other tracks play on the same step. It then picks three or four parameters (always pan or level, plus a distortion or filter control) and moves them by role:

• backbone downbeats keep their place and level;
• ghost notes get quieter, darker, thinner or panned;
• fills build, with a crescendo or the filter opening;
• delay and reverb throws go on hits with room after them, such as the pattern's last hit.

Hits that repeat get the same move every bar, so the groove keeps its shape. Pitch, decay, attack and sample start and end are never touched, and your own locks are kept. Press again for another take: the pattern first goes back to how it was before. Press Play once after loading a project, before the first spice.

Pattern generator

With Record on, Shift + a track button writes a whole new pattern on that track, replacing the pattern its view shows (with Record off, the same press is spice). Press again for another. Each press draws one of four styles:

• industrial techno: 16 or 32 steps, a repeating cell, accents on the beats, a fill at the end;
• power noise: the densest, long gates on the accents, six-fold ratchets, heavy Grid FX (crusher, stutter, looper);
• IDM: odd lengths (7 to 31 steps) or 20, 28 and 32 (repeating in halves), nudged micro-steps, odd ratchet shapes, reverser and looper;
• broken: 12, 24 or 32 steps, sparse, swung or straight, long gates, delay and reverb throws.

Each pattern is built from a cell that repeats exactly: velocities follow the metre (beats strong, offbeats softer), the cell has one ratchet spot, fixed ghost notes and, in power noise and IDM, one recurring Grid FX spot. Only the last cell, the fill, varies, with a few extra hits, ratchets and effects.

Everything a step can hold is used: the pattern's length, velocity, gate, micro-steps (ratchets of 2, 3 or 6, flams, late nudges), probability, parameter locks (distortion, filters, sends, level and pan, moved by role as in spice, more boldly) and Grid FX locks on a few hits, mostly fills and accents. The pitch is never touched: every step plays the sample at its own pitch. Decay, attack and sample start and end are left alone too. The pattern is an ordinary one: edit it, save it, or press again.

Two paths: one sound, or the pack

Press Sample Rec again to open its second view (where samples are placed on steps). There, the first two pads of the bottom row choose how the next pattern is made:

On the pack path, every hit flips to a sample chosen for its role (the Rhythm's sample flip). Samples made by the generator carry their recipe, so their role is known: kicks, snares and claps, hats and cymbals, metal and other percussion, noise and destroyed sounds, clicks. Samples you recorded yourself are placed by where they sit on their page: pads 1–4 kicks, 5–8 snares, 9–12 hats, 13–16 percussion. Each role gets its own layer (snare on the backbeat, kick on the beats, hats off the beat, percussion syncopated, noise in the fills, clicks as ghosts), with two samples per role for variety. With no samples in the pack, the track's own sound is used. The choice stays until you change it.

Differences from the official firmware

• Level and pan move faster. The Rhythm smooths every level and pan change over about 100 ms; SteamRoller shortens that to about 5 ms (still smooth) so that locks land on the transient. Mixer moves follow your hand more tightly.
• Grid FX and the returns. The Grid FX now process the tracks only, not the reverb and delay returns or the audio input.
• Mixer lanes. Level, pan, delay and reverb automation plays as locks, like every other lane.
• Recording automation writes one value per step (no glides between knob moves).

Going back

To return to the official firmware, start the Rhythm in update mode (hold Sample Rec, Samples and Note while switching on) and reinstall the firmware with Novation Components. Your projects, packs and stored sounds stay on the device; locks added with SteamRoller play as plain automation there.